Nicole Kidman in real-life court drama

The actor Nicole Kidman was the star of a real courtroom drama yesterday when she described how she was "really, really scared" as she crouched down on the back seat of her car as it was pursued by a photographer in Australia.

At a libel hearing at New South Wales state supreme court in Sydney, she said she feared her car would crash in the incident nearly three years ago involving the photographer Jamie Fawcett. Her driver told her "they were driving crazy". When she arrived at her parents' house her driver was shaken and she was "in tears and distressed", she said.

The actor was called to testify before Judge Carolyn Simpson who is considering whether to award Fawcett damages against the publisher of the Sun-Herald newspaper. A jury has already found defamatory an article in the newspaper that said Fawcett was Sydney's most disliked freelance photographer and that his behaviour towards the actor was so "intrusive and threatening" that he scared her.

Kidman said the photographer had often been seen outside her Sydney home. "I have been pursued many times, in relation to this particular man and the people he has employed to follow me," she said. The actor said she was now too scared to drive herself and employed 24 hour security service.

Kidman was mobbed by photographers as she left court after 45 minutes in the witness box. The case continues.